


together like glue

by wrishwrosh



Category: Men's Hockey RPF
Genre: Alternate Universe, M/M, public rinks
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-07
Updated: 2019-04-07
Packaged: 2020-01-04 09:55:18
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,849
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18341312
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/wrishwrosh/pseuds/wrishwrosh
Summary: JT's job is, at best, fine: all he does is hand skates over to ten-year-olds at birthday parties and hound washed up ex-high school players for checks. The highlight of his day is usually whatever dumbass five minute conversation he has with Josty. He likes to think that this is more a commentary on how boring his job is than on his thing for Josty. He likes to think it’s at least 70-30.





	together like glue

**Author's Note:**

  * In response to a prompt by [Actual_Dunwich_Horror](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Actual_Dunwich_Horror/pseuds/Actual_Dunwich_Horror) in the [wesmashing](https://archiveofourown.org/collections/wesmashing) collection. 



> **Prompt:** One of the boys works at the rink (runs the zam, cleans, hands out skate rentals, concessions, merch, you name it) and the other is a semi-pro/beer league/rec league player and they keep seeing each other and eventually fall in love. 
> 
> thanks to andi for looking this over! title from this is the day by the the

 

JT’s specialty at work is hiding, mostly. More specifically, hiding from EJ, because EJ’s specialty is looming. For example, sometimes when JT is dicking around in the corner with his back to the skate rental desk, disinfecting the same five pairs of skates over and over again so he won’t have to speak to any rink patrons or answer the phone, EJ will come up very quietly behind him and stand there, staring over his shoulder for between ten seconds and a fully minute.

“Whatcha up to back here?” EJ says, directly into JT’s ear. JT jumps a mile, knocking over his pile of skates. That is a blessing and a curse, because it’s gonna take him a good minute and a half to get those paired back up again in their cubbies, assuming, of course, that he moves real slow. He always moves real slow. If JT’s done his math right, he has about 35 disinfections and pairings left in his shift.

“Y’know. Skates. Gotta make sure these skates are in great shape, so people will wanna rent the, uh, skates.” He reaches out with one finger to nudge a child sized figure skate back from the edge of the table.

“Wanna help me out at the rentals counter for a sec?” EJ asks with an enormous toothless grin. JT doesn’t, actually, wanna help at the rentals counter. JT hates the rentals counter, and EJ knows it. The only he hates more than the rentals counter is cleaning confetti out of the locker rooms after a birthday party, which is the worst job known to man.

“I would love to help out at the rentals counter,” JT says through gritted teeth.

“Great, I’m going on break, you’re in charge,” EJ says, already pulling out his phone. “I’ll be out back. Please don’t need anything, if you do need something don’t call me, you know the drill.”

“Enjoy your break,” JT says. Assuming nobody actually comes up to the counter while EJ’s out back looking at horses on Craigslist, JT now has a solid fifteen minutes to fuck around on Barstool on the scheduling computer. That cuts down on the number of disinfections and pairings by about nine or ten, easy.

EJ salutes him with two fingers and slams out the back door. “Oh, by the way,” he yells, “The Hacky Sakics’ rink fee is due today. So make sure you get that before they all leave.”

JT groans, hopefully loud enough for EJ to hear. Of all the rec league teams that play at this rink, the Hacky Sakics are the most difficult to get any money out of. Probably because JT’s pretty friendly with a bunch of them, and it’s hard to wrestle a business relationship out of all the banter. Or maybe because they’re all a bunch of flaky assholes. Instead of addressing any of these concerns, EJ just lets the door slam shut behind him.

JT gives up entirely on the possibility of a break as, not one minute after EJ leaves, Nemeth streaks across the lobby towards the parking lot.

“Hey Nemo,” he yells. They aren’t supposed to yell in the lobby, but there aren't any peewee skaters lingering in the arcade right now. JT will consider himself in the clear. “You got a check for me?”

Nemo doesn’t even turn around. “Sorry, jag pratar inte engelska,” he shouts. “Skitstövel.”

“I know you just called me a name, asshole.”

“Specifically he called you a shit boot,” says Landeskog, emerging from the locker room in a stream of other Hacky Sakics.

“You owe me money,” JT tells their backs half-heartedly. Gabe just shoots him a beauty queen smile and wave as he heads out the rink’s front door.

Technically he can count that as trying to do his job. It isn’t technically his fault that the Hacky Sakics are all dicks. Well, mostly dicks, JT thinks, as Josty approaches the rentals counter.

“‘Sup, Justin Timberlake,” says Josty.

He smells like ass. For some reason he’s carrying two gear bags, both of which also smell like ass. At some point since the Hacky Sakics’ last appearance at the rink, he’s acquired some truly uninspired facial hair.

“It’s not November,” JT says.

“Uh, good evening to you too,” says Josty. He actually pulls out his phone to check the date, like it isn’t literally March. “I guess it isn’t November, which matters to you why?”

“Just wondering what your excuse is for that mustache.”

“Shut up, it makes me look older,” Josty says. He reaches up and pats his upper lip.

JT snorts. “Makes you look diseased. That’s not gonna stop you getting carded.”

Josty grins. “How would you know? We’ve never gone out together. You don’t know what my bar game is like.”

“Are you and Kerfoot still sharing an ID, or what?”

Josty blushes and bites the inside of his cheek, fishing for a comeback that clearly isn’t coming any time soon. It does something weird and almost appealing to his cheekbones under the scrubby facial hair, which JT finds himself looking at a little too closely, so he decides to put Josty out of his misery.

“I hope you came over here because you’re dying to give me your team’s rink fee.”

“Why would I have that?” Josty asks, swaying slightly under the weight of the second hockey bag, which for some reason he’s carrying on the same shoulder as the first one. “I’m like, the second-least responsible person on the team.”

“Nobody else seems to know where it is, and it’s due today.”

Josty shrugs lopsidedly. “I have literally no idea. I can’t even remember if I turned in my own dues.”

JT sighs, but the situation isn’t that urgent. He knows that EJ builds at least a three week buffer into all of the rec teams’ due dates. He calls it the Dumbass Window.

“Did you ask Landy?” Josty asks. “He’s technically in charge, right?” He doesn’t sound super sure of that objective fact. Gabe is the official captain on all the paperwork except the paperwork that he forgot to sign, on which JT had to forge his signature. So in some small way, JT is also technically in charge. It’s a burden he absolutely doesn’t intend to bear.

“He called me a boot full of shit and left. Whose bag are you carrying?”

Josty swivels, looking down at the bags. “Oh yeah. This one’s Kerfy’s and this one’s Nate’s,” he says, pointing to each one as he says it.

JT blinks. “Where’s _your_ bag?”

“I don’t know. I think they’re hazing me,” Josty says cheerfully. His phone buzzes. “That’s probably my ride, shit.”

“Making Kerfy wait in the parking lot again, huh?” JT has absolutely no feelings about Josty inconveniencing his ride to stay late and talk to him. He does not care about that at all.

“Pfft, Kerfy’s fine. His car has heated seats and everything.” Josty pulls his phone out and starts typing furiously as he limps away under the weight of Kerfy and Nate’s bags. “See you later, Jacob Theodore.”

“Still not my name,” JT calls after him. He watches Josty’s sweaty curls bounce all the way out the door.

+

EJ comes back inside ten minutes after his fifteen minutes are up. “They pay you?” he asks.

“Course not,” says JT, mostly thinking about Josty’s hair.

+

The thing is, JT is fine. He has an apartment, he has a job and three roommates and one of those roommates’ girlfriends to pay for that apartment. He goes to work, he comes home from work. Sometimes he watches Netflix on his roommate’s girlfriend’s parents’ account. He doesn’t have any hobbies, but nobody has hobbies. It’s fine.

His job is also, at best, fine: all JT does is hand skates over to ten-year-olds at birthday parties and hound washed up ex-high school players for checks. When EJ’s not working he drives the Zamboni, poorly. Sometimes he mops, with even less conviction than the Zamboni-driving. Whatever he does, it’s rarely important and never exciting. The highlight of his day is usually whatever dumbass five minute conversation he has with Josty after the Hacky Sakics play. He likes to think that this is more a commentary on how boring his job is than on his thing for Josty. He likes to think it’s at least 70-30.

“You should come to a game sometime,” Josty says, propping an elbow up on JT’s counter and disturbing the newsletter signup clipboard. He’s just finished up giving JT a very comprehensive shot-by-shot breakdown of his performance that night against the Rubber Puckies. Josty got two goals and two assists in what was, according to him, a hard-fought 8-3 victory. JT has a suspicion that Josty might actually be pretty good at hockey. This is a very good reason, in JT’s book, to avoid all Hacky Sakics games forever. “You really should, I promise they’re fun.”

“Should I,” says JT. If he doesn’t play his grandma back in Words With Friends within an hour, his mom will call and yell at him about how lonely Nana June has been since she moved into assisted living and how he needs to be a better grandson, so that’s taking precedence over Josty’s offer right now.

Josty leans over the counter to look at the computer screen. “If you use the F and the Z you can put zebrafish,” he says, jabbing at the screen with a slightly damp finger. “We’ve got a back to back Wednesday-Thursday against Junk Punch and Your Mom Two, but Wednesday’s probably gonna be more interesting cause Junk Punch is, like, bottom of the league bad right now.”

“Mm,” JT says. He wipes Josty’s smudge off the screen and plays zebrafish for 36 points. He’s absolutely decimating Nana. “What happened to the original Your Mom?”

“According to Landy they split because of ideological differences, whatever the fuck that means. I think it had something to do with one of their actual moms.” Josty leans somehow further over the counter. It’s kind of a wide counter. JT has a feeling Josty’s feet aren’t even on the floor anymore. “If you can’t come Wednesday or Thursday we have an afternoon game against Santoro’s Pizza next Saturday, I think.”

“I know your whole schedule,” JT says. “EJ makes me proofread it every month.”

Josty deflates, his smirk going a little flat as he slides partway back off the counter. “Well,” he rallies, “then you already know whether there’s a game you can make. With your schedule. And you should, if you can.”

Josty isn’t moving his eyebrows as much anymore, and JT feels a sudden, dumb desperation to fix that. He shrugs. “Maybe I’ll, uh, check on that, or something.” Josty brightens immediately.

“Fuck yeah! Oh, dude, it’s gonna be great. The team is really good this year,” he says earnestly. Like he really genuinely cares about his shitty rec team’s place in the made-up rec standings, because he’s a genuinely good-hearted and enthusiastic person. Fuck.

Last year JT’s phone started doing this thing where it vibrated so violently he could hear it from anywhere in his apartment. If he set it on a table, it buzzed right off whenever he got a notification. That’s what JT’s heart feels like right now, and he hates it. He wants to take his emotions to the Apple Store.

While they’ve been talking, the stream of sweaty players and long-suffering family members pouring out of the rink has slowed to a trickle. JT decides to take the out before he accidentally expresses a feeling he’ll regret.

“Kerfy’s gonna put a hit out if you keep making him wait for you,” JT says. Kerfy does some kind of entry level grunt work in finance and likes to pretend his time is worth more money than it actually is. His time is, however, probably worth more than JT’s. JT makes thirty cents over minimum wage to touch insoles that a thousand people’s sweaty feet have been in.

Josty swivels around like he’s expecting Kerfy to be waiting behind him with a knife. “Shit, I guess so,” he says. “I’ll see you at a game, Julius T-Caesar.”

JT feels like he’s about to explode from the burst of gross tenderness that blasts through all of his systems when he hears that dumb nickname, and from how much he wants to turn the tenderness off. He’d like to know if there’s any switches he can flip. Maybe he can invest in an emotional fuse box.

+

JT’s off on Thursday and working closing on Friday, and when he goes to clock in on Friday afternoon there’s a sheet of paper waiting for him under the computer keyboard. He assumes it’s just an updated copy of the Disco Skate playlist, because EJ’s twinky French boyfriend is always trying to make terrible suggestions. But he takes a closer look and sees that it’s a copy of the Hacky Sakics’ schedule. Scrawled on top in almost unreadable handwriting is _INCASE U LOST THE OTHER ONE_ alongside a stick figure wearing either hockey skates or elf shoes.

Josty’s escalating. Given that JT spent Thursday night dicking around his apartment and swallowing a little burst of guilt whenever he thought about the Hacky Sakics-Your Mom Two matchup he was missing, it’s probably going to work.

+

JT doesn’t like being into people. It’s inconvenient. It makes him do stupid, inexplicable shit, like going into EJ’s files on the scheduling computer to cross-reference his work hours with the Hacky Sakics’ game days. Like coming in to the rink on one of his rare Saturdays off and climbing up into the stands, which he himself swept yesterday. Like settling in to watch the Hacky Sakics play Santoro’s Pizza with a gas station coffee and a Snickers he stole from the employee break room, just so he can watch Josty skate.

It’s an unusual vibe for sure. The stands are mostly empty, and it would be pretty quiet if not for somebody blasting shitty country on a shittier bluetooth speaker between the benches. There’s only three other people in JT’s whole row: a teenage boy disinterestedly scrolling through his phone and a woman with a toddler who he thinks might be Zadorov’s wife and kid.

The level of chatter and jeering between the Sakics and Santoro's peaks and then plateaus as they take the ice. Zadorov’s baby perks up; the other guy in the row does not look up from his phone. JT spots Josty below him on the bench, considers waving, and does not wave.

Unfortunately, Josty is just as good a skater as JT dreamed he would be. Not that JT has actually dreamed about it, because he doesn't usually remember his dreams and also he’s not in that deep. At most he’s occasionally thought about Josty skating. Pictured it. Maybe lingered on that mental picture. It’s fine. Josty’s a good skater.

Josty’s a really good skater, actually. The Hacky Sakics as a whole aren’t bad for a rec league team that practices every other week, but Josty stands out. He bops up and down the ice like he’s having the time of his life, and with ten minutes left in the game he scores a goal that makes the Santoro’s goalie look like a complete idiot. When it happens, JT is so momentarily overwhelmed that he squeezes his coffee cup too hard and accidentally spills lukewarm Stinker-brand decaf down his shirt.

The coffee’s mostly dry by the time the Hacky Sakics win four to two. The crowd starts to flow down the bleachers towards the bench, but JT stays put. He could loop around by the back wall and sneak out through the Zamboni door and he would never have to let Josty know that he cared enough to actually come to a game. He shouldn’t do that, but he could.

But then he hears, “Hey Jimothy Timothy,” and he looks down at the ice to see Josty waving like he’s trying to land a plane. JT’s sitting in row seven of ten, not in space. The choice is made for him. JT goes down to the ice, coffee stain and all.

“You made it!” Josty says when JT gets down to his level, glowing. “What’d you think?”

“That was a nice goal there in the third,” JT says, shoving his hands in his jacket pockets.

Josty raises his eyebrow impossibly higher in his weird Play-Doh face. “You think so?”

JT feels himself blush. He crosses his arms, which hopefully covers up the coffee stain on his shirt and makes his biceps look bigger. “I’m not gonna say it again,” he deflects. “Nice try.”

“Worth a shot, Jaroslav Tytus,” Josty says brightly.

“Damn, where’d you get that one?”

“It’s Polish. I googled it.”

JT nods his approval. “You’re wrong, but I like the creativity.”

Josty shrugs happily. “I didn’t think it was right, but I actually worked pretty hard on the pronunciation, so.” He takes his helmet off, and underneath his hair is matted and wild. He has a dumb-looking red indent across his forehead where the helmet was digging in. He looks awful. JT’s so into it.

“Anyways,” Josty says, “I’m glad you came. It’s good to see you out of uniform.”

JT’s uniform at the rink is a polo with a logo on it. Today, he’s wearing a polo without a logo on it.

“Who’s that, Josty?” Nate hoots from the vicinity of the penalty box, where he’s shooting the shit with one of the Santoro’s Pizza guys and sloshing probably-spiked Gatorade all over the ice. JT is suddenly filled with the same exhausted dread he gets whenever he sees anyone making his job harder, and then he remembers he’s here in his unpaid free time and he won’t have to resurface a lemon-lime spot after closing tonight.

Gabe joins in, yelling at the top of his lungs from the other side of the bench. “Yeah, Josty, who’s your special friend? Wait, shit—is that the desk guy?”

“Fuck off,” JT yells back, “You don’t even know my name?”

“You’re all dead to me,” says Josty, speaking to the rink at large. “If you guys are dicks to Jeffrey Trent he won’t come back.”

He turns back to JT and says, with burning earnestness and full eyebrow, “You’re coming back, right? You liked it?”

“Uh,” says JT.

“He has to come back,” Gabe says. “He literally gets a paycheck to hang out with you.”

“So did all of your friends in high school, but I don’t hear you bitching,” Josty shoots back. Across the ice, Nate laughs so hard he pops the top off his Gatorade bottle. That’s not JT’s problem. Gabe launches himself at Josty and gets him in a headlock, which isn’t JT’s problem either until Josty’s face gets even more flushed and his hair gets somehow curlier and he’s cackling as he tries to elbow Gabe in the dick.

It wasn’t even a good joke. JT’s an idiot surrounded by idiots with a bigass crush on another idiot, and he’s man enough to admit it.

+

“Can I come back there?”

JT doesn’t look up from the April free skate schedule, which EJ said needed more clip art of rain clouds before they send it out in the newsletter. He just points at the “Employees Only” sign tacked up on the office door. “Get a job, bud.”

“C’mon,” Josty whines. “What, is EJ back there? Is he gonna yell at me?” Josty is absolutely terrified of EJ, a fact EJ absolutely exploits whenever he can.

“Nah, he isn’t in today,” says JT, resizing the smiling raindrop hovering next to April 17th.

“Dope,” Josty says. He drops his bag in front of the desk with a thump and ducks down below the level of the counter where JT can’t see him. JT decides firstly that he doesn’t want to ask, and secondly that the raindrop looked better in its original size. The door to the lobby creaks open then slams closed, and JT looks over to see Josty crab-walking towards him like something out of a shitty horror movie.

“What the _fuck_ are you doing?” JT asks.

“I’m being sneaky,” says Josty, flushed. “This way everyone will think it’s just employees back here.”

JT wants to laugh, but instead he channels that energy by throwing a pen at Josty’s head. Josty dodges and collapses in a pile, kicking JT’s chair as he goes down.

“This is so dumb,” JT says.

“Takes one to know one, Josiah Terrence.”

“That one was also dumb.” JT swivels his chair away as Josty peels himself up off the speckled, balding carpet. He’s wearing basketball shorts. There’s more thigh involved in the process of standing up than JT remembered. He swivels his chair back.

Josty hoists himself up to sit on the counter, taking in the back room in all of its grungy, skate-filled glory. There’s absolutely nothing exciting going on back here, except maybe the skate sharpener or, if you’re EJ, the thoroughbred-of-the-day calendar on the manager’s desk. It also kind of smells, with the kind of concentrated foot stink that prompts JT to spend entire shifts disinfecting skate liners. Josty nods his approval.

“What, you like what you see back here?” JT asks.

Josty looks down at JT from his perch on top of the skate sizing chart, tilts his head like a puppy, and nods again more decisively. JT is hit with a wave of _something_ so strong he wants to retract his arms into his body. Instead he just kind of huffs, which counts as a response.

“I feel like I should play a prank,” Josty says. “Or steal something. I’ve got a lot of behind the scenes access here.”

JT fishes one of the shiny pebbles out of the pen cup and holds it up to Josty. “Here, steal this. Take a souvenir from this special time.”

Josty plucks the rock out of JT’s hand, inspecting it cross-eyed. “This is dece, but it isn’t really stealing, y’know?”

“Alright then,” JT says. “I’m gonna turn around real quick, and you do what you have to do.” He swivels his chair towards the wall pointedly. Behind his back, he hears the clinking of somebody digging around in the pen cup. While he’s turned around, he takes a moment to make a horrible face at nothing. This feels like the first time he and Josty have ever really been in the same space. There's always been the counter between them, or the width of the bench, or the entire lobby if Josty’s actually in a hurry for once. But now Josty’s on JT’s side of the counter, stealing his pen rocks a mere two feet away, and JT has to just handle that somehow.

“Okay, I’m done.”

JT turns back around. Josty’s hands are in his lap and he’s glowing with smugness, visibly on the verge of laughing at his own joke. As always, fuck.

“Y’know what would be fun,” says Josty with an especially powerful eyebrow wiggle. He nudges JT with his knee, and then kind of just leaves his foot hovering on JT’s armrest. Next to JT’s arm, which is also on JT’s armrest.

“Besides stealing fake rocks from a public ice rink?” JT rotates the chair a little bit, just to see, but Josty keeps his foot planted firm on the arm.

“What would be fun,” says Josty, undeterred, “is if you joined the Hacky Sakics.”

“Ha, nope,” says JT, mostly without thinking. He generally just sort of instinctively turns down every offer anybody ever makes him, just in case. He doesn’t like to get roped into stuff.

“Why not? What, do you not know how to skate?” Josty asks. He sounds genuinely offended by the possibility.

“I know how to skate,” JT scoffs. “They wouldn’t have hired me to work in a fucking ice rink if I couldn’t skate. I just choose not to, usually.”

Josty smirks. “Oh? I thinks the lady doth protest too mucheth,” he says.

“You’re so close, buddy. You’re really almost there.”

Josty doesn’t take the bait, leaning in closer. His ankle is no longer just brushing JT’s arm. They’ve upgraded to fully touching. “You haven’t been to that much more college than me, J—James Thomas?”

“Good effort, but no.”

“Why won’t you come to practice, huh? Shit, do you have a tragic backstory?” Josty drops his voice to a gleefully hushed whisper.

JT rolls his eyes. “No, I don’t. I just don’t want to go.” He crosses his arms to punctuate that point, then realizes how much like a seven-year-old that makes him look and drops them back to the armrests. For about a millisecond, his whole arm is in contact with Josty’s whole leg. The undisciplined, shithead part of his brain remembers the time seven years ago that he read a Reddit thread about _breaking the touch barrier_ , which according to Reddit users was very important in progressing a relationship. JT wishes he could surgically remove that memory, and all of his other memories.

“You can tell me about your pain,” says Josty, very earnestly, as though their relationship did not just progress. “You can trust me with your issues.”

“I’m not gonna skate with you. Or trust you with my issues, actually.”

Josty raises an eyebrow. “So then you admit you have issues. Check and mate, buddy.” JT doesn’t have any deep-seated issues. He just has a really unfortunate need to never admit that he was wrong or go back on any decision he’s ever made. He can’t just change his mind in front of Josty, who might see that as a sign of weakness. So he can’t practice with the Hacky Sakics. He’s in too deep.

JT can skate. He enjoys skating. He enjoys both watching and playing in hockey games. He also loves to self-sabotage. Anyway, he doesn’t want to cross the streams. He works with the Hacky Sakics. It would be weird to play with them, too, even though part of him wants to, deep down, a little, a lot.

Josty just shrugs at him, looking out over the lobby. “You’ve seen us play,” he says. “So, like, you’re missing out, but no big deal.”

“No big deal,” says JT, staring at the side of Josty’s face. He’s getting dangerously close to thinking that Josty has a majestic profile or some shit. Death would be kinder.

“Seriously, though,” Josty says. “If you can skate, like, at all, we’ll take you. Most of us aren’t even good. It’s just for fun.”

The kicker is, it probably would be fun. But regardless, the instinct that makes JT twitchy when good things happen in his life is already running on overdrive, and he can’t help kicking this conversation in its figurative teeth.

“You know, EJ has this whole office wired up with CCTV,” he says.

“Aw, fuck,” Josty says, scrambling to swing his legs over the other side of the counter. He overbalances, stumbling to the lobby floor with a dull thud. “Aw, he’s gonna come to my house and kill me for fucking with his _rocks_.”

“Too bad your address is on all the Hacky Sakics paperwork.” That isn’t true. It also isn’t strictly true that the office has CCTV. EJ’s predecessor had a system installed sometime in the late nineties, but as long as JT’s been working here he’s never once seen EJ turn it on. JT isn’t sure whether EJ’s trying to make a point about surveillance or if he’s just too lazy to bother.

Josty scoops his bag up off the floor. “When I’m dead tell Kerfy I was the one who got the blender lid stuck in the shower drain,” he says.

“I’m sure he knows that already,” JT says, waving goodbye.

+

EJ designates every other Wednesday as filing day, and on this particular Wednesday JT is looking forward to an exciting afternoon of photocopying summer camp sign-up paperwork. Probably he’ll spice things up by stapling his finger to something on accident, which has happened before. He comes close to fulfilling that prophecy a little early when he sees Josty jogging across the lobby to the locker room.

“Hey James Tiberius,” Josty shouts, winded. He doesn’t pause in his stride, probably because Hacky Sakics ice time started ten minutes ago and also because EJ is at the desk wielding scissors. “Come to practice!”

“Can’t,” JT says, snapping the stapler in his direction. “So busy.”

Josty looks over his shoulder and pouts. “Boo,” he yells, disappearing down the hallway. At this point JT’s fully 75 percent sure he’s doing all that on purpose. He must be.

“Hey EJ,” JT says, “Can you snag me a waiver?”

“Oh, done flirting?” says EJ, not looking up from the stack of allergy disclosures he’s cutting in half.

“Shut up. Waiver me.”

EJ opens the drawer under the desk where they keep the waivers and says, bewildered, “Where did all these pebbles come from?”

+

It’s no secret to anyone that JT isn’t super passionate about rink management. The list of things in his entire life that he _is_ passionate about is very short and very embarrassing. But among his many stupid and slightly frustrating official duties at the rink, there’s one thing that he will admit is a tiny bit exciting. One thing that he doesn’t completely hate: the handful of minutes right after closing but before the final resurfacing of the night, when he goes to scope out the ice and make sure nobody left out any loose pucks or spare cones or sparkly hair ties after open skate. The entire rink is empty, bright and quiet and peaceful, and the only sound is JT’s borrowed rental skates on the ice.

He only gets the chance every once in a while. If JT’s lucky, it’s about once a week. Sometimes he gets caught up with last minute skate returns or has to supervise the 8th graders in the lobby waiting for their parents to pick them up after Nineties Night. More rarely, the last skaters actually clean up after themselves. But when it happens, it’s really nice.

Tonight’s a lucky night where it’s happening. One of the after-school skating clinics left out all their cones, and he’s got probably ten minutes to skate around before EJ starts passive aggressively Zamboni-ing. He does a couple aimless figure eights up and down the ice, relishing the feel of the blades underneath him even if the skates are too small in the toes and have legitimate bite marks on the left heel.

“AH HAH,” someone shrieks from somewhere behind him. JT whips around, startling so bad he drops the whole stack of cones he’s collected so far. It’s Josty.

“What are you still doing here?” JT yells back.

“I KNEW YOU COULD SKATE,” Josty yells with his hands cupped around his mouth. The sound reverberates across the empty rink.

JT gives up, scooping up his cones and skating over to where Josty’s pressed to the glass. He feels sort of squirmy about this situation. On the one hand, Josty is here interrupting his peaceful, private skate. On the other hand, Josty is here. He can’t decide if he minds.

“I never said I couldn’t skate,” JT says, stopping hard right before the boards in a way that is definitely not designed to show off his skating ability. “You were the one who decided I was lying about it.”

“You’re, like, not even bad,” says Josty, with a kind of offensive note of surprise in his voice. “I thought you didn’t wanna come skate with us because you were, like, self conscious or whatever.”

“No, I’m not bad, thanks,” says JT, trying and probably failing to hit a tone somewhere between smug and affronted, because Josty did indirectly compliment him, but the compliment was very indirect. His face is getting hot. He sets the cones down on the edge of the boards, and they immediately fall right off.

Josty peels himself off the glass and leans back on his heels. “Okay, well, uh, good skating.” He crosses his arms tight across his chest.

“Thanks,” says JT. He already said thanks. He doesn’t know what’s going on.

“I’m sorry, I can stop bothering you. This is, like, your place of work and shit,” Josty blurts.

“Oh,” JT says. “I mean, if you want.”

Josty raises an eyebrow. “Uh, I think that’s supposed to be up to you? Because, like, I keep bugging you to hang out with the Hacky Sakics and you never want to, and I kind of just realized that it might be kind of weird of me, because you, like, have to be polite to people at work and shit—“

“No,” says JT’s mouth, without any input from his brain. He gives up.

“What?” says Josty.

“Have you ever seen me be polite to anybody?”

“Wait, I’m kinda confused,” Josty says, leaning back towards him.

“So am I, power through,” JT says. The cones are still on the ice at his feet but this conversation, like most things, is more important to him than his job. He raises his voice a little to be sure Josty can hear him through the glass.

“I’m terrible at my job. I don’t like my job. The best part of this stupid job is hanging out with you.” JT tries to make really genuine eye contact. He’s not sure what genuine eye contact is supposed to be like, but he hopes he’s doing it. It feels like he forgot how to have eyes.

Josty blinks, running a hand through his hair. “Wait, so—“

“Also I really like your hair,” JT says, before he loses his nerve.

Josty freezes with his hand still tangled in his curls. JT wants that hand to be his hand, or both of their hands, and then they could touch hands. Also he really wants to pull Josty’s hair. While he’s processing that, Josty leans in so close that his nose is almost pressed to the glass.

“You chose kind of a stupid place to have this conversation,” Josty says, tapping the glass with one finger.

“ _You’re_ the one who snuck in here to yell at _me_ ,” says JT.

“Literal sheet of plexiglass between us, John Tristan.”

“Not my name or my fault.”

“Not gonna lie, I kinda thought I had it with that one.”

“Nope,” says JT, crossing his arms. He can’t really feel his hands. He assumes that’s one of the side effects of emotional disclosure.

“Aw shit,” says Josty, thunking his forehead off the glass. He’s pressed so close his breath is fogging it up in a little sweaty cloud. “You’re doing the arm thing again. Put the biceps away, Jolin Tirth. No, wait, Janning Tatum.”

“Shut the fuck up,” says JT. He’s smiling so hard the corners of his mouth kind of hurt. He tries to bite his lips to stop it, but he can feel it burning through anyway. He’s never gonna pick up those stupid cones, and EJ’s just going to have to deal with it.

 

 

**Author's Note:**

> this is brought to you by the south suburban family sports center: where the avs practice, where i learned to skate, and where a kid once threw a blue raspberry slushie at me during a tenth birthday party. long may she reign.
> 
> all the rec league team names (except the hacky sakics) are real teams in the rocky mountain rec hockey league, bc i could not possibly have come up with anything funnier.
> 
> i got a [tumblr](http://softbarrie.tumblr.com/), come say hey


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